November 1, 2013, Last AP Formation Day Celebration?

Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy will take the salute of the ceremonial parade on the occasion of Andhra Pradesh Formation Day on Friday.

With the Centre taking a decision to bifurcate Andhra Pradesh to form a separate Telangana state, the Friday's celebrations may go into the history as the last celebrations, and Kiran Kumar Reddy will be the last Chief Minister to participate in the ceremonial parade, to be held at NTR Stadium near Indira Park.

While addressing a meeting at Visakhapatnam, the Chief Minister reiterated that he was an integrationist.

While it seems unlikely that Telangana ministers will participate in the celebrations, there is a possibility that Seemandhra leaders may use the occasion to reiterate their demand to keep the state united.

The YSRCP has already demanded that the occasion be observed as Integration Day. The Telugu Desam Party leaders are divided on the issue.

The Andhra Pradesh state was formed on 1st November 1956 by merging the Andhra State with the Telugu-speaking areas of the already existing Hyderabad state.

The Marathi speaking areas of erstwhile Hyderabad State were merged with Bombay State and Kannada speaking areas were merged with the Mysore State.

The decision to bifurcate Andhra Pradesh to carve out Telangana has already got the nod of the Union Cabinet, and a Group of Ministers (GoM) has been constituted to complete the process.

The Centre is likely to introduce the Telangana Bill during the Parliament's monsoon session in the second week of December this year.

Once the Bill is passed, Telangana state will be a reality and Andhra Pradesh, in its present form, will cease to exist. (INN)